"Our biggest challenge for 2009 is the same as last year's - building a team of world class product people. So much of Songkick's future will be determined by the quality of our user experience, and thereby by our product team. A top class developer, designer or product manager can create orders of magnitude more value than an average one and I expect they will continue to be in high demand.

"We'll invest through the downturn in our product team, hiring slowly and carefully, but continuing to search hard for truly outstanding people. Efficient use of capital will be critical, but if the majority of your cost is payroll then the best thing you can do is to put together a small, compact, group of passionate product fanatics, get your head down and focus on building something people love."